Foreign Pulse: Don’t cry for Uncle Sam

Jun 03, 2014

Sreeram Chaulia

http://www.asianage.com/columnists/foreign-pulse-don-t-cry-uncle-sam-709

The world is changing so fast that taking one’s eyes off the ball could be a blinder. It has gone almost unnoticed that this year China will surpass the United States in overall economic size measured by the purchasing power parity (PPP) method. Michael Forsythe and Neil Gough of the New York Times extrapolate from World Bank figures of 2011 to the present and conclude that China “is on track to overtake the United States this year as the world’s biggest economy, years sooner than many economists had previously forecast.” The same economic data set reveals that India is now “the world’s third largest economy, moving ahead of Japan.”

While academicians debate the accuracy and appropriateness of the PPP method vis-à-vis the nominal method of calculating gross domestic product (GDP), the reality is that America can no longer sustain itself as the number one economy. This change of guard has huge implications for global order.

The American scholar Joseph Nye argued in 2010 that “economic power has been multipolar for more than a decade, with the United States, Europe, Japan and China as the major players and others gaining in importance.” The latest advent of India into the top league and the further shuffling of the deck among major players, wherein the US is ceding the leading spot to China, signify that a new era has dawned.

The former have-nots who were colonised and whose historic clocks were deliberately frozen for three centuries are now reclaiming their lead roles.

The “American century”, which Henry Luce equated to the 20th century in Life magazine’s 1941 edition on grounds that the United States was “the most powerful and the most vital nation in the world”, is now passé.

To be sure, the US still retains unrivalled supremacy in relative military strength, with China and the rest lagging behind at a safe distance. Nye reminds us that “military power is largely unipolar, and the United States is likely to retain primacy for quite some time.” America’s comparative fall in global power standings is limited to economic indicators. But given the conversion mechanism between economic and military capabilities, we can imagine the US conceding even military leadership of the world within our lifetimes.

When GDP stagnates and the economy gets into a long funk, as has been the case with the US since 2008, allocating massive sums to defence and continuing expan-sionist military policies worldwide are no longer easy options. The high government debt-to-GDP ratio in America of over 100 per cent and the attendant across-the-board budget cuts have created a new long-term trajectory of military downsizing, whose effects in battle and armed power projection will be evident in a decade from now.

As if taking a bow to this less rosy future for the American military, US President Barack Obama delivered a major speech at the United States Military Academy at West Point last week rebutting the conservative belief “that every problem has a military solution.”

He is signalling and preparing the American public and intelligentsia for a new sobered age when the US would not have the means to use gunboats, fighter jets and boots on the ground with the same gung-ho self-assuredness that marked Luce’s “American century”. The cowboy has realised that he is running out of ammo. In light of the economic displacement of the United States by China and its potential drag-down effect on the American military, what kind of new forces will be able to take the lead in ordering the world? Mr Obama’s rhetorical flourish at West Point contended that “America must always lead on the world stage. If we don’t, no one else will.”

What China still seek from Russian military export

June 1, 2014

Source Link

With the recent signing of the major gas deal between China and Russia amidst the entire situation in Ukraine, there has been a big push by the media and Putin himself to frame all of this as somewhat of an alliance between the countries. While I generally think this is overplayed, I think the military cooperation part of things can be explored. Russia is coming to China from a position of weakness and is probably willing to sell technology they were not willing to before. The question is what China actually wants from Russia at this point.

Last year, I talked about the possible Su-35/Lada deals here. At this point, I would bet that neither deal goes forward. Even if some kind of conventional submarine deal gets signed, it will be more for a design based on Lada that will use mostly Chinese combat systems, engine and weaponry. The Su-35 talks have floated since 2008 and still have not ended up anywhere. The closer we get to J-20, the less it makes sense for China to purchase Su-35. In the recent visit by Putin, the 2 countries signed deals for cooperating on a new upgraded version of Mi-26 and large airliner. In the aviation fields, China’s biggest import from Russia remains to be high performing turbofan engines.

In the most recent join sea drill between China and Russia, Russia sent a fleet consist of the Slava-Class Cruiser Varyag, a Udaloy class destroyer, a Sov class destroyer and a landing ship. Chinese fleet was consisted of No. 151 Zhengzhou (Type 052C), No. 139 Ningbo (Sov class), No. 112 Harbin (Type 052), 2 Type 054As and landing ships. The drill lasted for 5 days in East China Sea, so it was probably the largest such drill between the 2 countries. If this exercises had taken place in 2005, there would’ve been many articles about how this is a showcase of Russian weaponry for export to China. We certainly don’t hear that kind of talk now. Just by focusing on Type 052C Zhengzhou and Slava-Class Varyag, we can see the different approach China has taken in its naval modernization vs Soviet naval philosophy. In the role of area air defense, Type 052C probably has comparable to superior capabilities to Slava with its 48 cell HHQ-9 VLS and more modern AESA MFRs + combat system vs 64 cell S-300 VLS. It’s pretty much weaker in everything else (close-in air defense, ASuW and ASW). Like its big brother Kirov class, Slava class can operate and pack a lot of punch (with 16 P-500 missiles) by itself, whereas 052C is better served as an air defense escort in a flotilla with other offensive options. When looking at where PLAN has proceeded in its modernization, it makes a lot of sense why China did not purchase the unfinished Slava class Ukraina when it could have done so in the middle of last decade. I have talked about how Sov class had become the white elephants of PLAN, because they could not effective communicate and operate with other ships due to having different combat system, communication equipments and data link. Numerous projects were started in recent years to create subsystem to solve these problems when the Sov destroyers go through their mid-life overhaul. Purchasing the Ukraina or any other Russian warships will have cause similar difficulties in combat and logistics. PLAN seems to have a pretty good direction forward with mass production of Type 052D and Type 055, so it has not been tempted to buy Russian hardware since early 2000s.

China, Russia, and the Outlook for the Liberal International System

Ali Wyne

June 2, 2014 · in Analysis

Source Link

Last week at West Point, President Obama observed that “Russia’s aggression towards former Soviet states unnerves capitals in Europe while China’s economic rise and military reach worries its neighbors.” He explained that the United States could strengthen its leadership in the world by extending its “effort to strengthen and enforce international order.” The president went on to note the importance of “standing with our allies on behalf of international order” and “having other nations maintain order in their own neighborhoods.” Given the growing perception abroad of U.S. weakness and indecisiveness, Russia and China’s actions lend greater urgency to a central question of our time: what is the outlook for the liberal international system? Two of today’s most important foreign-policy thinkers grapple with it in the new issue of Foreign Affairs.

In “The Return of Geopolitics,” Walter Russell Mead—a professor of foreign affairs and humanities at Bard College and editor-at-large of TheAmerican Interest—contends that Western policymakers misinterpreted the Soviet Union’s collapse to signify not only the “the ideological triumph of liberal capitalist democracy,” but also “the obsolescence of hard power.” Increasingly, he argues, “China, Iran, and Russia are all pushing back against the political settlement of the Cold War.” While there may be no “strategic alliance among them,” they are united in “their agreement that the status quo must be revised” and in their judgment that “U.S. power is the chief obstacle to achieving their revisionist goals.”

John Ikenberry—a professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University—retorts in “The Illusion of Geopolitics” that China and Russia are “part-time spoilers at best” (he omits Iran from his analysis, arguing that it is, on balance, “engaged more in futile protest than actual resistance” to today’s system). Confronting “the most globally organized and deeply entrenched order the world has ever seen,” those two countries would be undertaking a “fool’s errand” if they tried to “contest [its] basic terms.” While Ikenberry does not argue that today’s system can or will endure in its current configuration on its own, he is confident that it will grow more entrenched if the United States continues to strengthen the “network of alliances, institutions, geopolitical bargains, client states, and democratic partnerships” over which it presides.

China Is Sending Combat Troops to Africa

Assertive Beijing deploys infantry to Mali

https://medium.com/war-is-boring/chinas-plan-for-africa-send-in-the-combat-troops-58e40b3c7a09

In late 2013, Beijing sent an infantry detachment to serve in the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali. This is the first overseas deployment of Chinese combat troops in a peacekeeping role.

The deployment didn’t receive much initial attention, but it’s another sign of a slowly but increasingly assertive Chinese role in conflicts around the world.

In all fairness, this can be a good thing. Chinese troops are able to reinforce under-equipped and poorly-manned peacekeeping missions. If Beijing wants to be seen as less aggressive, then teaming up with the U.N. is a good way to do it.

“China’s combat troops will abide by the U.N.’s peacekeeping regulations. Soldiers are allowed to open fire only for self-defense purposes, and never take positions to help either party during a civil war,” retired Maj. Gen. Xu Guangyu reassured the South China Morning Post.

But there’s also a price to bringing in the People’s Liberation Army. For one, Chinese influence in Africa means greater access to natural resources. That helps fuel a growing Chinese economy.

However, that can also mean blurring the line between solving conflicts and making them worse.

Red star, blue helmets

China contributes around 2,200 peacekeepers to missions all over the world. To put that into perspective, that’s more than all the other four permanent security council members combined.

The Chinese peacekeepers are working not only in Mali—but Western Sahara, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Cyprus and Lebanon.

In general, these missions have traditionally focused on support functions, with most of the personnel being doctors or engineers, rather than combat troops. But that’s not to say that they haven’t been exposed to danger.

During the 2006 war in Lebanon, an Israeli airstrike killed Chinese Maj. Du Zhaoyu, who was serving as a U.N. military observer. Chinese engineers in Lebanon have also engaged in dangerous de-mining operations, clearing out landmines and other unexploded ordinance throughout Lebanon’s demarcated Blue Line.

In the past, small detachments of Chinese infantry have deployed to protect their contingents of doctors and peacekeepers. But in Mali, Chinese troops are actively patrolling and conducting security operations in the remote, northeastern city of Gao.

Though Gao was relatively secure when the Chinese arrived—French forces recaptured the city from Islamist rebels in January 2013—the deployment is not without its risks. At least 14 Chinese soldiers have been killed in peacekeeping operations globally.

China’s Cyber Espionage Capabilities Are Deeper Than Most People Realize

Source Link

May 30, 2014

China Hacking Is Deep and Diverse, Experts Say

Danny Yadron, James T. Areddy and Paul Mozur

Wall Street Journal

China’s Internet espionage capabilities are deeper and more widely dispersed than the U.S. indictment of five army officers last week suggests, former top government officials say, extending to a sprawling hacking-industrial complex that shields the Chinese government but also sometimes backfires on Beijing.

Some of the most sophisticated intruders observed by U.S. officials and private-sector security firms work as hackers for hire and at makeshift defense contractors, not the government, and aren’t among those named in the indictment. In recent years, engineers from this crowd have broken into servers atGoogle Inc., Lockheed Martin Corp. and top cybersecurity companies, former U.S. officials and security researchers alleged.

The Chinese have often told their U.S. counterparts they don’t condone hacking but also that they can’t police what they don’t control, according to former U.S. officials. While it is possible Beijing makes this claim simply as an excuse for inaction—given its strict control of domestic Internet traffic—experts in the field, including former U.S. officials, say the Chinese hacking landscape is chaotic and hard to follow.

This structure brings “a political gain to being able to say ‘we can’t control all attacks,’ ” said Adam Segal, a China and cybersecurity scholar at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. “But I think there is a cost when hackers go after targets that are too sensitive or get involved in a crisis and the government can’t control the signaling.”

Sometimes freelancers appear to take orders from the military, at other times from state-owned firms seeking a competitive advantage, U.S. security firms say. It remains unclear how exactly those orders are given, security researchers said.

This diffusion of China’s hacking activities underscores the challenge the U.S. faces in addressing what Washington considers economic espionage.

"Part of the consternation when we were pushing them was there is not complete knowledge of what’s going on," said a former U.S. official, recalling cyber negotiations with China.

Kevin Mandia, chief operating officer of FireEye Inc., FEYE +0.79% a cybersecurity firm, said some of the best hacks appear to be by one of several Chinese groups, which his colleagues refer to as “unknown.”

Ukraine: A Prize Neither Russia Nor the West Can Afford to Win

Article | May 22, 2014

Source Link

By: Clifford G. Gaddy and Barry W. Ickes

Authors' Note: This article is based on a section of our paper, “Beyond the Sanctions: Russia, the West, and Ukraine.”

Almost forgotten in the discussions of the conflict between Russia and the West is what happens to Ukraine. The answer to that question, like so many other problems, depends on how much each side is willing to pay for their preferred outcome. It is important therefore to understand the costs of the potential outcomes for Ukraine and how those costs will be apportioned between Russia and the West.

The West sees itself as defending Ukraine against Russia, and since it won’t wage military war against Russia it has two main ways to do that, both economic. The first is to shore up Ukraine’s huge economic vulnerabilities, mainly by helping Ukraine pay its bills and plug its deficits. The IMF has pledged $17 billion to that end, the EU a nearly equal sum. The second way the West is defending Ukraine is to levy economic sanctions against Russia to deter it from further aggression.

From Russia’s standpoint, things are more complicated, but in the end there, too, it comes down to economics. Russia sees Ukraine as a front in a war being waged by the West against Russia. Through its actions in Ukraine, Russia is telling the West to stop using the country as a staging ground for operations against Russia. Russia sees sanctions as a yet another weapon in the West’s war. Russia knows it is far inferior to its adversaries in terms of economic size and strength (the combined GDP of Russia’s NATO and EU adversaries is roughly 15 times that of Russia’s), so it has opted not to engage in tit-for-tat responses to Western sanctions. Instead, it resorts to “asymmetric” measures. It looks for weak spots. One obvious such weak spot is Ukraine’s economy. The Russia attitude is, if the Western coalition wants to use Ukraine against us, let them see how much it will cost.

It is clear to most observers that the West would not be able to defend Ukraine economically from a hostile Russia. Russia is in a position to do far more damage than the West can defend against or repair. It’s always true that it’s easier to undermine a country economically than to build it up. It’s easier to destabilize than stabilize. It is perhaps less evident that the West would have a very hard time stabilizing the Ukrainian economy even if Russia weren’t around to make mischief. The simple fact is that Russia today supports the Ukrainian economy to the tune of at least $5 billion, perhaps as much as $10 billion, each year.

When we talk about subsidies, we usually think of Russia’s ability to offer Ukraine cheap gas — which it does when it wants to. But there are many more ways Russia supports Ukraine, only they are hidden. The main support comes in form of Russian orders to Ukrainian heavy manufacturing enterprises. This part of Ukrainian industry depends almost entirely on demand from Russia. They wouldn’t be able to sell to anyone else. The southern and eastern provinces of Ukraine are dominated by Soviet-era dinosaur enterprises similar to Russia’s. They were all built in Soviet times as part of a single, integrated energy-abundant economy. They could be sustained only thanks to the rents from Soviet (overwhelmingly Russian) oil and gas. Russian subsidies have continued to maintain the structure in the post-Soviet era. Because most of these subsidies are informal, they do not appear in official statistics. (In fact, not even Putin talks about them, though it might be to his advantage to do so, because acknowledging the existence of hidden Russian subsidies to value-destroying Ukrainian enterprises would expose the fact that the same thing goes on, on a much greater scale, with their Russian counterparts. They, too, are not producing real value.)

What ails the United Nations?

31/05/2014

http://www.claws.in/what-ails-the-united-nations-surya-kiran-sharma.html

Surya Kiran Sharma

E-Mail- surya1503@gmail.com

As the world watches the events unfold in Ukraine, the United Nations moves deeper into the abyss. Set up in 1945 in the backdrop of the culmination of the Second World War, the UN was expected to usher in an era of international co-operation, peace and security. But the intergovernmental organisation has failed to live up to its Charter and is en-course to follow in the footsteps of its predecessor, the League of Nations. Much deliberation and effort is needed to help the UN avoid the same fate as the League of Nations and maintain its relevance in the fast-changing global order.

Founded in 1919 as a result of the Paris Peace Conference that followed the end of the First World War, the League of Nations was designed to prevent armed aggression through collective security and disarmament. However, it lacked its own armed force and had to depend on member-nations to enforce its resolutions. With the United States refusing to become a member of the League and deciding to act unilaterally, the League of Nations, without military force to back up its protestations, became nothing more than a forum for discussion with states acting in their self-interest. France and Belgium invaded the Ruhr in 1923 after Germany failed to repay its share of reparations imposed by the Treaty of Versailles while Japan demonstrated its power in Asia by invading the province of Manchuria in China in 1931-33 and left the League in 1933. Italy annexed the Greek island of Corfu in 1923 and Abyssinia in 1935 which only warranted namesake economic sanctions from the League. Germany followed suit in 1936 by re-militarising Rhineland to violate the terms of the Treaty of Versailles and the Locarno Treaty and to further undermine the authority of the League of Nations.

As the Second World War drew to a close, the victorious Allied powers met to formulate plans for the creation of an international organisation on the lines of the League of Nations but with stronger political and military support from the five most powerful nations at the time: the United States, U.S.S.R., France, China and Britain. As other countries struggled to recover from the financial and personnel losses suffered in the war, the U.S. was forced to shoulder the responsibility of guiding the UN through its early years of rebuilding and restructuring.

Japan, Lawfare and the East China Sea

http://thediplomat.com/2014/06/japan-lawfare-and-the-east-china-sea/

Tokyo should consider arbitration for its maritime disputes, although not necessarily for the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands. 

By Christian Le Mière

June 03, 2014

In an article published by The Diplomat on May 29, Jerome Cohen makes an impassioned and well-reasoned argument for states in East Asia to utilize independent, third-party arbitration mechanisms wherever possible to challenge China’s maximalist claims.

This was very much the theme of a question I asked Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at his opening keynote addressat this year’s Shangri-La Dialogue. Essentially, I asked the question as I wanted to challenge his strong theme of international law in his speech by highlighting Tokyo’s seeming reticence to take the Senkaku/Diaoyu islands dispute to international arbitration. His answer was effectively to support the statement made by former foreign minister Koichiro Gemba in November 2012, that Japan is subject to compulsory arbitration under UNCLOS, but it is up to China to bring the case to court because Japan doesn’t consider there to be a dispute.

But I realized as soon as I had sat down (isn’t it always the way?) that I had asked the wrong question, and a slight tailoring of the content could have proven much more interesting and even pointed Tokyo in the direction of a potential new route to manage tensions with China. What I should have asked is whether Abe would also consider taking the overlapping exclusive economic zones (EEZs) in the East China Sea, north of and separate to the islands dispute, to international arbitration as international law suggests should happen when peaceful negotiation is not working.

The overlapping EEZ claims, which cover an area of approximately 40,000 square kilometers, would fall under the jurisdiction of the International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea as they do not rely on competing claims of sovereignty over land. An agreement was previously reached by Japan and China in 2008 on joint resource exploration, but it was never implemented as relations soured quickly following the arrest of a Chinese trawler captain in 2010.

Iran-Pakistan: New Leaders, Old Issues

30 May 2014

Ayesha Khanyari

Research Assistant, IReS, IPCS 

Email: ayesha.khanyari@gmail.com

http://www.ipcs.org/article/pakistan/iran-pakistan-new-leaders-old-issues-4479.html

“I am here to open a new chapter in Pakistan-Iran relationship,” Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said, on a two-day visit to Iran from 11-12 May 2014 – one that took place after a sixteen-year gap.

The visit took place at a time when ties between the two neighbours have seen tensions. The Iran-Pakistan Pipeline project remains stalled, with Iran doubting Pakistan’s commitment towards the project. The relationship further soured in February 2014 when five Iranian border guards were abducted by militants and allegedly held in Pakistan. In a bid to recover the guards, Iran threatened that it wouldn’t refrain from sending its forces across the border if need arose, when Pakistan failed to respond in a timely manner.

Amid growing concerns regarding the closeness Pakistan and Saudi Arabia enjoy, Islamabad is walking a tight rope between a long-term ally Riyadh, and Tehran, a neighbour. However, the new leaders – Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in Pakistan and President Hassan Rouhani in Iran – both of whom were elected in mid-2013 seem committed to strengthening ties.

There are many reasons for Tehran and Islamabad’s eagerness to preserve close ties.

First, in his recent trip, Prime Minister Sharif informed the Iranian president that Islamabad was determined to weed out all the obstacles that currently cause friction and prevent the pipeline project from moving forward. More than economic benefits, for both the countries, the project is a crucial guidepost on the path towards greater partnership between Islamabad and Tehran. During the meeting, both the leaders reiterated their commitment to strengthen energy and security ties between the two nations.

Second, the border security issue between the two countries also featured in the discussion, where Prime Minister Sharif assured Tehran that his country will “eliminate Jaish-ul-Adl,” the militant group that captured the Iranian border guards. Iran blamed Saudi Arabia for supporting the rebel group and Pakistan for not doing enough to secure the release of the guards. Pakistan does not intend to be party to the growing tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran. 

Russia and the unravelling of economic sanctions

IDSA COMMENT

http://idsa.in/idsacomments/Russiaandtheunravellingofeconomicsanctions_rroy_300514

Rajorshi Roy

May 30, 2014

The G7 countries led by the US have imposed additional economic sanctions on Russia due to its perceived meddling in eastern and southern Ukraine. These sanctions, enforced from the end of April, are now targeted against Russian companies and banks having substantial links to the Kremlin. The aim is to deprive Moscow of Western technology and investment and disrupting its financial system thereby forcing President Putin to back down. While the impact of these sanctions has so far been limited yet few trends reveal a grim outlook for the Russian economy. Its capital flight is expected to breach the US$ 100 billion mark by the end of this year, rouble and stock market have continued to plunge since January and economic growth is expected to be the lowest in a decade.

These trends highlight the possibility of an impending economic gloom. However, it also raises a few pertinent questions: Will sanctions spur Russia to implement the much needed economic reforms? Can they influence the direction of Russia’s foreign policy? and What do these developments signify for India?

Russia’s response to tackle the crisis

It can be argued that Russia’s influence in global affairs is limited on account of its lack of global economic competitiveness. The current negative forecast is a symptom of several flaws plaguing the economy. Restrictions on transfer of Western technology and capital that prop up several key sectors of the economy will only make matters worse. Faced with a gripping economic problem, sanctions can just be the incentive that Russia needs to implement structural reforms and reduce its dependency on the West. The emergence of anti-West and patriotic sentiments can help the Kremlin to push through difficult initiatives. These include tackling endemic corruption, improving business climate and rule of law, diversifying the economy from its heavy dependence on hydrocarbon exports and promoting innovation and capacity building. Doing so will also improve Russia’s soft power potential which President Putin has championed in his concept of a new Russian World (‘Russkiy Mir’).

Moreover, Russia retains significant monetary reserves to cushion any disruption in the short to medium term. With oil prices still holding high, there exist opportunities to initiate the modernisation drive without excessively curbing social spending. The Skolkovo innovation hub can be a good starting point in the endeavour to build a robust national innovation system and a knowledge based economy.

Sanctions can also force Russia to establish its own financial systems. Visa and Master Card’s suspension of payments is likely to fast-track the development of a national payment system. Similarly, the proposal to set up rouble as a reserve currency is bound to gain momentum. There are also expectations of Russian capital coming back to the country on account of uncertainty about stashing money abroad. This can help offset the capital flight.

Obama's counterterrorism doctrine: Let locals lead the fight

BUSINESS

May 31

By David Rhode

http://in.mobile.reuters.com/article/idINKBN0EB0FL20140531?irpc=932

NEW YORK (Reuters) - In a foreign policy address this week, U.S. President Barack Obama gave his clearest outline yet of his counterterrorism strategy. Al Qaeda splinter groups remain the largest threat to the United States, he said, but Washington must respond to it in a new way: by training local security forces, not deploying American ground troops.

“We have to develop a strategy that matches this diffuse threat - one that expands our reach without sending forces that stretch our military too thin, or stir up local resentments,” Obama said. “We need partners to fight terrorists alongside us.”

But critics say America's past efforts to train local security forces have had mixed results. Washington has a poor track record of applying the long-term resources, funding and attention needed to carry out such efforts successfully.

In Libya, training by U.S. Special Forces soldiers was suspended after a local militia stole a cache of American-provided weapons. In Mali, American-trained military officers carried out a coup. And in Afghanistan, the United States failed to mount a major training effort until nine years after the fall of the Taliban.

Finding the effective partners Obama described has proven challenging as well. For years, the United States has struggled to get Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey to coordinate their support to Syria’s panoply of rebel factions. And the kidnapping of 200 Nigerian school girls in April exposed the inability of American officials to get the Nigerian government to address the endemic corruption that helps fuel the al Qaeda splinter group Boko Haram.

Bruce Hoffman, an expert on terrorism and Georgetown University professor, said a cardinal failing of the American counterterrorism effort since 2001 has been its haphazard nature. Hoffman said the United States focused its effort on Afghanistan in 2001, shifted to Iraq in 2003, returned to Afghanistan in 2009. Now, Obama announced a shift from Afghanistan to Syria.

“It continues our pathology,” Hoffman said. “Our attention has shifted from one trouble spot to another with disastrous results.”

In his address on Wednesday, Obama unveiled a $5 billion “Counterterrorism Partnerships Fund” to train local forces in the Middle East and Africa and voiced support for increasing American training and assistance to “moderate” Syrian rebels. "A strategy that involves invading every country that harbors terrorist networks is naïve and unsustainable," he said.

Obama said the new fund would allow the United States to expand training of security forces in Yemen fighting al Qaeda, support a multinational force trying to stabilize Somalia, and work with European allies training local forces in Libya and Mali. Citing the 2012 attack on the American consulate in Benghazi and last September's attack on a shopping mall in Nairobi, he said the United States faced a different type of threat.

New Books Says Israel Intercepted Telephone Calls Between Bill Clinton and Syrian Leader Hafez Al-Assad in 1999

Source Link

May 30, 2014

Israel Eavesdropped on President Clinton’s Diplomatic Phone Calls

Jeff Stein

Newsweek

Israeli intelligence eavesdropped on phone calls between President Bill Clinton and Syria’s late strongman Hafez al-Assad during sensitive Middle East peace negotiations 15 years ago, a forthcoming book says, citing verbatim transcripts of the calls.

Israeli intelligence also listened in as Syria’s foreign minister in New York called Assad in Damascus to report on his private conversations with American officials during the delicate 1999 talks, according to Ahron Bregman, author of Cursed Victory: A History of Israel and the Occupied Territories, scheduled forpublication in the U.K. next week.

Bregman, a British-Israeli political scientist and author of several books about the Jewish state and the Arabs, cites unnamed “private sources” who provided him transcripts of the telephone calls, and of confidential conversations in 1999 between Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. Bregman also obtained a copy of a letter from Clinton’s Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, to Barak’s predecessor as prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, marked “SECRET,” promising that the U.S. would check with Israel first before offering peace proposals to the Arabs. “Recognizing the desirability of avoiding putting forward proposals that Israel would consider unsatisfactory,” Albright wrote Netanyahu onNov. 24, 1998, “the U.S. will conduct a thorough consultation process with Israel in advance with respect to any ideas the U.S. may wish to offer to the parties for their consideration. This would be particularly true,” Albright wrote, “with respect to security issues or territorial issues related to security…”

Albright, who was traveling in Brazil this week, declined to comment, according to an aide. Aides to former President Clinton did not respond to emails and phone calls asking for comment, nor did the Israeli embassy in Washington. A spokesperson for the White House National Security Council also declined to comment.

The wiretapping revelations will likely be greeted in Israel as explosive, analysts said, not for what the conversations exposed so much as the fact that they were leaked – suggesting that there is “an Israeli Edward Snowden,” as one put it.

Ronen Bergman, senior military and intelligence affairs correspondent for Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel’s largest circulation daily, said the wiretapped conversations “dovetail with what is known about the negotiations under way at the time between Israel and Syria under American mediation,” but wondered about who was listening.

“Was it Israel that listened in to these conversations? This is a tough question to answer,” he told Newsweek “There’s no doubt that Israel was (and still is) interested in eavesdropping on Assad or any other Syrian president, but did its surveillance include his conversations with the president of the United States? Was Ehud Barak running spies in Washington?”

IN A SOMBRE MOOD- The European Union’s widespread unpopularity

Krishnan Srinivasan

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1140603/jsp/opinion/story_18470525.jsp

Europe is going through one of its recurring periods of acute discomfort. Eurocrisis seems to have become the new normal, especially after the global recession of 2008 induced by the United States and the subsequent Euro-debt catastrophe across the ‘olive belt’ — the southern states using the common currency of the Union. Just when it was emerging to some extent from that Eurozone crisis, and economic growth, though minimal, was being forecast by the International Monetary Fund, the European Union has been hard hit by another disaster, causing one leader to claim, on May 26, that Europe has become inscrutable and incomprehensible even to governments. This was from no eurosceptic, but a person passionately devoted to the European Union, and no less a dignitary than President François Hollande of France himself.

The proximate reason for this soul-searching and breast-beating is the recently concluded elections for the European Parliament, which the Union wishes, as soon as possible, to make the legislative centre for all the 28 states of the Union. The fact that 63 per cent turned out to vote in 1979, when the first parliamentary elections were held, against only 43 per cent on May 25 this year was bad enough. But, in some countries, the electorate was astonishingly apathetic — for example, in Slovakia, only 13 per cent of the electorate voted. Even worse, the voting trend in many countries was completely dismissive of the European Union. Both the political extreme Right and the extreme Left, comprising anti-EU, anti-immigration and anti-austerity parties made unprecedented gains.

In France, the extreme Right National Front took 25 per cent of the vote; in Britain, the UK Independence Party held over 27 per cent; in Denmark, a similar party took 27 per cent, in Austria 20 per cent, in Italy 21 per cent, in Hungary 15 per cent and in Holland 13 per cent. At the other end of the spectrum, in Greece the far Left, the Syriza party, won 26 per cent and the far Right 10 per cent. Of the big countries, only Germany and Poland resisted this trend, and even there, the extreme Right scored 7 per cent each. But the overall message is loud and clear: that there is a huge, bubbling, popular dissatisfaction with the European Union. The heads of government have met at Brussels to discuss this problem, all agreeing that something should be done and the voting underlined the need for reform. But, in the end, it was, predictably, business as usual. Germany and France see the problem as being not too-much Europe but not enough, and they will continue to press for even stronger political and economic integration.

JUST ASSUME WE HAVE A CLIMATE CRISIS – OPED

JUNE 2, 2014 PAUL DRIESSEN

http://www.eurasiareview.com/02062014-just-assume-climate-crisis-oped/

By Paul Driessen

Climate modelers and disaster proponents remind me of the four guys who were marooned on an island, after their plane went down. The engineer began drawing plans for a boat; the lumberjack cut trees to build it; the pilot plotted a course to the nearest known civilization. But the economist just sat there. The exasperated workers asked him why he wasn’t helping.

“I don’t see the problem,” he replied. “Why can’t we just assume we have a boat, get on it and leave?”

In the case of climate change, those making the assumptions demand that we act immediately to avert planetary crises based solely on their computer model predictions. It’s like demanding that governments enact laws to safeguard us from velociraptors, after Jurassic Park scientists found that dinosaur DNA could be extracted from fossilized mosquitoes … and brought the carnivores back to special-effects life.

Climate models help improve our conceptual understandings of climate systems and the forces that drive climate change. However, they are terrible at predicting Earth’s temperature and other components of its climate. They should never be used to set or justify policies, laws and regulations – such as what the Environmental Protection Agency is about to impose on CO2 emissions from coal-fired power plants.

Even our best climate scientists still have only a limited grasp of Earth’s highly complex and chaotic climate systems, and the many interrelated solar, cosmic, oceanic, atmospheric, terrestrial and other forces that control climate and weather. Even the best models are only as good as that understanding.

Worse, the models and the science behind them have been horribly politicized. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was ostensibly organized in 1988 to examine possible human influences on Earth’s climate. In reality, Swedish meteorologist Bert Bolin and environmental activist groups wanted to use global warming to drive an anti-hydrocarbon, limited-growth agenda. That meant they somehow had to find a human influence on the climate – even if the best they could come up with was “Thebalance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.” [emphasis added]

“Discernible” (ie, detectable) soon metamorphosed into “dominant,” which quickly morphed into the absurd notion that greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have now replaced natural forces and become the only factors influencing climate change. They are certainly the only factors that climate activists and alarmists want to talk about, while they attempt to silence debate, criticism and skepticism. They use the models to generate scary “scenarios” that are presented as actual predictions of future calamities.

New Traffic Data Shows Russian and Ukrainian Hackers Have Continued to Bombard Each Other With Malware Attacks Since the Crimea Crisis

Source Link

May 30, 2014

Malware Callbacks Point to Heavy Cyber Attack Barrage During Crimea Crisis

Infosecurity Magazine

May 29, 2014

FIREEYE DATA SHOWS COMMUNICATIONS BACK TO C&C SERVERS IN RUSSIA AND UKRAINE SPIKED AS GEOPOLITICAL TENSIONS HEIGHTENED.

Malware attacks on Russia and Ukraine have rocketed in recent months, hinting that cyber operatives on both sides may be actively engaged in online campaigns, according to new data from FireEye.

The targeted attack specialist analyzed malware callbacks within both countries over the past 16 months.

Callbacks are the communications from compromised machines to “first stage” command and control (C&C) servers, which can be a good indication of attack activity.

“As we track the evolution of callbacks during this period, we see a likely correlation between the overall number of callbacks both to Russia and to Ukraine, and the intensification of the crisis between the two nations,” wrote FireEye senior global threat analyst, Kenneth Geers, in a blog post.

In fact, Russia was number 7 on the global list of nations by number of callbacks, but has risen to fifth so far this year. Ukraine has jumped from 12th to 9th.

Geers said that, tellingly, the biggest jump was in March this year, when Russia jumped from 7th to 3rd place.

March was the same month the Russian military gathered along the Ukrainian border, the Duma authorized use of force in Ukraine, and Vladimir Putin signed a bill recognizing Crimea as part of Russia.

On March 4, the head of Ukraine’s SBU security service, Valentyn Nalivaichenko,told reporters that “an IP-telephonic attack is under way on mobile phones of members of Ukrainian parliament for the second day in row”.

FireEye spotted a rise in callbacks to Russia from compromised computers in a range of countries across the globe including South Korea, Italy, Japan and the US.

“It is important to note that nearly half of the world’s countries experienced a decrease in callbacks during this same time frame,” Geers clarified.

Ukraine and Russia both increased the number of source countries sending callbacks to C&C servers within their borders; Ukraine recorded an increase in source countries from 29 to 39 and Russia from 45 to 53.

Finally, Geers highlighted an increase in the volume of malware signatures associated with the callbacks to each country for February and March 2014.

While Ukraine was outside the top ten in 15th place, Russia came in fourth, with an increase of 33 between February and March. Again, by comparison half of the world’s countries saw either no increase or a decrease.

“Within such a large volume of malware activity, there are likely to be lone hackers, ‘patriotic hackers’, cyber criminals, Russian and Ukrainian government operations, and cyber operations initiated by other nations,” Geers said.

Relieved of command Leader tried to reach out; investigation cites favoritism

http://www.airforcetimes.com/article/20140531/NEWS/305310038

May. 31, 2014

Lt. Col. Craig Perry and his wife, Caroline, attended the Military Training Instructor Association honors banquet in October. (Courtesy photo)

By Kristin Davis

Staff writer

Lt. Col. Craig Perry and his wife, Caroline, involved themselves in the personal lives of airmen and families at their new command, a leadership approach encouraged from the top down to help identify those in need.

A month after Perry took the helm of a support squadron sustaining basic military training at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland in July, Caroline revived the languishing Key Spouse Program to reach out to families in her husband’s unit. She delivered baby gifts to first-time parents, cooked lunches for flight members and welcomed an airman alone during the holidays into their home.

But what the Perrys considered acts of kindness expected of commanders, investigators called favoritism and fraternization.

A January command-directed investigation report obtained by Air Force Times concluded Perry engaged in unprofessional relationships with enlisted members in his organization. He was relieved of command of the 737th Training Support Squadron on March 27 and issued a letter of reprimand.

Col. Mark Camerer, commander of the 37th Training Wing, said in an email statement he lost confidence in Perry’s ability to lead the squadron.

Once a standout officer on track for promotion to colonel, Perry has little hope of salvaging his career.

Whether he is being treated fairly is a matter of debate.

Perry may not have intentionally had unprofessional relationships or shown favoritism, the report said. Some applauded Perry’s fairness and others recalled favoritism.

“If you’re going to be relieved for things like favoritism, it should be a clear-cut case. They do not sound like clear-cut cases to me,” a retired officer told Air Force Times.

First-time commander

Perry briefly taught high school math in his native San Antonio after graduating from Brown University at the top of his class. He was commissioned in the Air Force in 1994, following in the footsteps of his grandfathers, who were combat pilots.

He spent much of his nearly two-decade career overseas as an intelligence officer, earning a master’s degree in Russia through the Olmsted Scholar Program. He was looking forward to commanding an operational unit in his career field last summer when he was handpicked to help lead one of nine basic military training squadrons in the wake of a sexual misconduct scandal that made headlines around the country.

What are the Basics? Developing for Mission Command

by Donald E. Vandergriff

Submitted by Fred on Wed, 05/21/2014

http://www.lesc.net/blog/what-are-basics-developing-mission-command-donald-e-vandergriff

At the start of every adaptability workshop I teach, I poll my students with this question, “please take a minute to list three items, in priority of what you feel is most important, you define as constituting what everyone calls ‘the basics’?” After which I take samples from a few of the students, sometimes as many as 15 (if I have a big class). As they list their “basics.” I ask them to define each one and tell the rest of us why they think their list are important. As they do this, I list them on a white board so everyone can see the differences. Though the exercise sometimes takes up to 30 minutes, it is well worth the time of proving a point. I have done this exercise over a hundred times with cadets, officers of all ranks, non-commissioned officers of all ranks, even at the Sergeant Majors Academy, police men and women, law students, graduate students and business managers. Of a list of anywhere from 15 to 45 words of what are the basics, two are hardly ever the same, and they range from “discipline” to “marksmanship”, “wearing the uniform”, even “drill and ceremony” has been included.

Okay, if we cannot define what is the “basic,” then at least we can tell how the Army is going to implement the doctrine of Mission Command. Or, can we?

The wordsmith as public intellectual

June 2, 2014

Mushirul Hasan

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/the-wordsmith-as-public-intellectual/article6072420.ece

THE HINDU ARCHIVESVERSATILE WRITER: As a lover of words and phrases which he used to express, intelligently and in ordered sequence, Nehru emerged as a public intellectual whose opinions mattered.

Nehru’s books make public his remarkable erudition in dealing with a range of subjects

The French political theorist Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859), talked about the part played in French political thinking by men of letters. In the second half of the 19th century, Bengal witnessed a “renaissance” to which literary men, reformers and journalists contributed their bit. Literary works in Urdu and Hindi had a striking impact in raising mass awakening. In this connection, I recount the creative writings of Jawaharlal Nehru to mark his 50th death anniversary (May 27). Most of his books were written in jail. His love of learning was too strong to be quenched by disabilities in jail.

“Long periods in prison,” Nehru wrote, “are apt to make one either a mental and physical wreck or a philosopher. I flatter myself that I kept myself very well during all these years.” As a lover of words and phrases which he used to express, intelligently and in ordered sequence, he emerged, perhaps unknowingly, as a public intellectual whose opinions mattered. And his books held an approach to life compounded of buoyancy and optimism, a humorous tolerance towards life’s foibles and even its trials.

Nehru read 55 books from May 21, 1922 till January 29, 1923 alone. Oscar Wilde’s The Ballad of Reading Gaol had a magical sway over him. Plato’s The Republic stimulated him, whereas To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf opened his eyes to many scenes of life. As a man with socialist leanings, he perused Beatrice Webb, a Fabian socialist, and Sidney Webb. Besides, he delved into philosophy, and turned the pages of history to illuminate his understanding of ideas and movements, which stood apart as the catalyst for momentous changes. As with the French Revolution or the Bolshevik Revolution, he wanted to know what lay behind people’s upsurge. For the histories of colonialism in India, he read a great deal more on the subject.An antidote to isolation

GENEROUS NEIGHBOUR

India has to take a long hard look at its foreign policy

Kanwal Sibal

Internally, much can improve with the spectacular electoral success of the Bharatiya Janata Party. India can now look forward to a strong and stable government at the Centre which the weak coalition governments of recent years failed to provide. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is seen as strong-minded, resolute and purposeful, raising fortified prospects of effective decision-making, policy implementation, economic management and internal security superintendence.

Externally, this will bring dividends too, given the linkage between domestic strength and confident conduct in foreign affairs. But triumphing over adversaries abroad is different from defeating political opponents at home. Internally, local insurgencies apart, issues of sovereignty and territorial integrity are not in contention. The country’s Constitution provides legal authority to deal with opponents, which is not available in dealing with external challengers, as international law is frequently violated and enforcement is weak. The size of the electoral victory can change the rapport of political forces at home, but other than strengthening the political image of the leader abroad in the short term, it does not affect external equations durably. In democracies, military strength is not needed to assert political authority at home; but to assert it abroad, military muscle is vital. Alliances erected against one’s country by enemies cannot be countered merely by electoral success at home, however impressive. Threats emanating from terrorism, religious extremism and proliferation of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles cannot be repulsed by the strength of the electoral mandate; nor does that provide an answer to energy security issues.

The nature of external challenges being different from internal ones, the acumen in understanding domestic politics may not be sufficient for grasping the complexities of international affairs, though a clear-headed leader with a discriminating mind can always handle foreign affairs competently with experience and good counsel.

The uniting bonds of citizenship and shared commitment to the nation can justify kindness towards domestic political opponents, but generosity towards foreign countries is not an established principle guiding foreign relations. Externally, all countries are expected to pursue their interests single-mindedly because it is considered axiomatic that in international relations there are no friends or enemies, only permanent national interests. In other words, there is no room for sentimentality and unrequited benevolence. This applies to neighbours as well as others.

Look Middle East Policy

C. Raja Mohan

June 2, 2014

http://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/look-middle-east-policy/99/

Prime Minister Narendra Modi must reach out to a region as critical to India as the subcontinent — the Middle East.

SUMMARY

Modi must reach out to the region, make a pragmatic break with the past.

After the impressive diplomatic start with the neighbours last week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi must reach out to a region as critical to India as the subcontinent — the Middle East. Despite its vital economic importance, cultural and physical proximity, and shared security concerns, the Middle East does not figure high on the list of New Delhi’s diplomatic priorities.

Consider, for example, the fact that former prime minister Manmohan Singh had hardly visited the region. He travelled just once to Iran and Egypt — to attend the summits of the non-aligned movement. Singh’s bilateral visits to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Oman — once each in the last decade — did not match India’s high stakes in the region.

Modi is in a good position to change this and take a strategic approach to the Middle East. Any reference to the region and the BJP government in the same sentence, however, leads us inevitably to Israel. For a variety of reasons, the BJP in the past tended to attach special importance to Israel. Criticising the Congress governments for their neglect of Israel, the BJP ideologues tended to privilege the relationship with Tel Aviv in the Middle East.

Recall the remarks of Jaswant Singh during a visit to Israel in 2000, the first by an Indian foreign minister, affirming that Delhi’s policy towards the Middle East was a victim of “vote-bank” politics at home. The NDA government hosted the first and only visit to India by an Israeli prime minister in 2003. The return of the Congress to power in 2004 saw the downgrading of the political engagement with Israel, even as security cooperation with Tel Aviv flourished under UPA rule.

There is a widespread perception today that Israel will be at the top of Modi’s diplomatic agenda. Israel is one of the few countries that Modi visited as the chief minister of Gujarat. And if he chooses to visit Israel again, he will become India’s first prime minister to do so.